Difficulty (Imp2)
There are five levels of difficulty in (with the same names as in ): #Introductory #Easy #Normal - where human and AI players are on almost equal footings #Hard #Nigh-On Impossible ("NOI") - the level routinely chosen by extremely good players Factors The default factors are offered at the start of a game, with points assigned to each level, e.g. 25 for Introductory, 100 for Normal, and 400 for NOI. The points are multiplied by your arithmetical sum of final achievements, such as provinces and ships, then divided by 10 to produce your overall score at the end of the game. You should have no trouble bettering Metternich's score if you win at any level! Below the table of five, there is a "Custom" option, letting you choose which combinations of factors you want, and varying the "points" accordingly. For most of them, you can choose to set the level to correspond with the default level for that factor at one of the five standard levels. You then see how much difference that makes to the "points". One reduction in difficulty that seems to have too little deduction from your points is the food disadvantage. At NOI level, 400, you start with no tech discoveries while your rivals each have the techs necessary to give them three levels of development on each grain or cattle tile within the radius of the capital. Reducing that disadvantage so that rivals have only two of each costs you only 10 points, so you start at 390. Cutting rivals down to one per tile drops you to 375. Players may feel that that is a more valuable concession than the points penalty suggests. Being able to increase your population early at half the rate or even the same rate as your rivals can make their other advantages (such as diplomatic lead or larger warehouse stocks and armies) fairly insignificant. Factors that affect points ;Food Economy :Simple or Complex ;Luxury Economy :Simple or Complex ;Diplomatic Head Start with Great Powers :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Diplomatic Head Start with Old World Minors :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Diplomatic Head Start with New World Nations :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Research Rate Advantage :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Tech Head Start, Food Gathering :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Tech Head Start, Miscellaneous :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Military Head Start :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Warehouse Head Start :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Treasury Head Start :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Credit Spending :Intro or Easy or Normal or Hard or Impossible ;Special AI Rules :Development Game or None or Aggressive Game ;Diplomatic Penalty for Human Expansion :Minimized or Reduced or Normal or Increased or Maximized ;Computer Player New World Expansion Advantage :Some or Large or Maximum Other options that do not affect scoring ;Select Your Own City Site :Select or Automatic ;Random Events :Off or On ;Computer Player Personalities :By Country or Random ;Foraging Rules :Off or On ;Cost of Attacking :Cheap or Normal or Prohibitive ;Old World Minors' Military Strength :Weak or Normal or Strong ;New World Military Strength :Weak or Normal or Strong ;New World Cavalry Unit Timing :Early or Middle or Late 2Category:Imperialism 2